


Too Far From Home

by sian1359



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Canon Disabled Character, Deaf Character, Deaf Clint Barton, Established Relationship, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mission Fic, Not Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Compliant, Pre-Avengers (2012), Strike Team Delta
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-28
Updated: 2015-12-28
Packaged: 2018-05-08 00:36:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,732
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5476460
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sian1359/pseuds/sian1359
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the middle of a StrikeTeam Delta mission, Clint wakes up without his hearing aids, without the ability to sign, and with amnesia.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Too Far From Home

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Starrie_Wolf](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Starrie_Wolf/gifts).



> I have the best beta, Auburnnothenna, who I love with the passion of a thousand burning suns. If you like what you read, so much of it is due to her.

 

 _He slowly grows aware that his state of being consists of pain, silence, and confusion. Pain and he are old acquaintances, so the panic stays muted, even if he has no recollection of why. Or maybe it's just that his head aches too much to allow his brain to panic. The utter silence is terrifying, but it might be a symptom of the pain, and even if he is totally wrong about the cause, silence pales in comparison to the hole in his mind. Acknowledging the black hole of missing memories, of his sense of_ self _, is what brings on the racing heartbeat and inability to catch his breath. It has him thrashing in an attempt to move that is thwarted by restraint and more agony. The darkness in his mind grows until it fully engulfs him. Until he knows nothing but the relief of unconsciousness._

 

"Clint's not back yet?"

Phil looked up from his computer screen at Natasha's question. "What do you mean Clint's not back yet?" He looked at his watch and then started to raise his head toward her again but did a double take with his watch. He'd been sitting at the desk for nearly two hours, which didn't seem possible, even if now he could feel it in his back and behind his eyes. Writing non-action reports always did take longer than putting together the after action reports, however, since Field Operations Control required every decision, movement, and expense to be justified when an op went overlong. They were already eleven days past the worst case projections. Things felt the same as when Strike Team Delta had arrived in Belgrade, although Phil knew it wasn't quite that bad.

Natasha gave him a narrowed stare, complete with thinned lips; she hated repeating herself, especially when someone else wasn't paying attention.

Phil nodded in acknowledgement of her displeasure and waved the question away. "I'll assume you've already checked all the rooms, the perimeter, and the roof. Did he at least come back at some point with lunch? If I've lost this much time, I suppose he might have said something to me about leaving again and I ignored him."

The look he got from her this time was more challenging and he could only shrug ruefully. He'd heard _her_ just fine, would never be so far gone into his work or thoughts as to ignore any fellow agent while on a mission, and when that agent was Clint … Yeah, stupid seemed to be his current default, although what did he expect from having to recount the last five days' worth of basically nothing, nothing and, what was that?, more nothing. Documenting everything that hadn't worked was a necessary evil though, on the chance that Hand might need to pull them for a more critical objective and put a different team on the job.

"Do you smell any moussaka baking?"

He shook his head and frowned as he looked at his watch once more. It was Clint's turn to cook, thus his leaving on a grocery run. He'd promised to add a stop at a shop he'd found that pre-cooked regional dishes like the potato-custard version of moussaka Natasha had been craving, that only needed to be put into the oven for browning. But that had been ninety minutes ago. Even with his joy of haggling at the local version of a farmer's market, Clint should have been back at least twenty minutes ago.

Phil pushed back from the desk and opened up the drawer in which he'd stashed his gun. Only to close it again without drawing it. Nondescript civilians did not walk around Belgrade while armed.

"If he's run into trouble, I should go. _I_ am his partner," Natasha began arguing. "We shouldn't chance the both of us also being compromised."

Phil's answering smile was ironic as well as rueful. As if she didn't already think him compromised or that her own objectivity wasn't suspect.

Natasha had been a member of SHIELD now for nearly three years. For all that relationships between handlers and assets had been a part of Natasha's own Red Room training, she still found Phil and Clint's relationship troubling despite knowing about it from the start of the twenty-five months of her and Clint's working missions together. The SHIELD psychologists had it down as a form of jealousy. To some extent Phil thought they were right, although he also thought it was unconscious on Natasha's part. It wasn't something she actively thought about or struggled with from wanting Clint as her own lover.

While she _was_ slowly learning to trust, Natasha saw devotion as a liability, and was not even willing to call it love. For her, affection had been something to use against someone else to accomplish your goal, a means to an end and nothing more. Phil suspected it had also been used _against_ Natasha, too many times for her to accept it now. Even if she wanted to.

"If Clint ran into opposition on a _grocery_ run, it's going to take the both of us to get him out," Phil pointed out, trying to sound reasonable instead of impatient. Any sort of heightened emotions during a mission made Natasha twitchy, and he was learning to reign himself in for the sake of their team. Nor was it as if being seen as unflappable wasn't helping his reputation around the Hub.

"If it was just stupid, bad luck, it's not going to matter if both of us are looking or not, other than being more likely we'll uncover what happened sooner by covering more ground quicker," he continued.

She still looked frustrated and ready to argue some more, until Phil said:

"He and I would be doing the same thing if it were you who was overdue, Natasha. Hell, I'd be calling in back-up. I don't even want to think about what kind of team would be needed to take down _you_."

For a moment she indulged in a self-satisfied smile, unused to praise but just as hungry for it as Clint was. Her expression turned into consternation, however, either because she minded the implied slight against Clint's lethalness, or because she was still wary about simply being a very skilled tool. Again, just like Clint had been when he'd first signed on to SHIELD.

Because he'd seen so much of himself in her, Clint had been the first to realize the Black Widow and Natasha Romanova were two very different people. To realize that there even was a Natasha Romanova underneath the Black Widow. The divide was so clean it was nearly a multiple personality disorder, and in those first weeks after Clint had brought her in, the salivating by the World Security Council over controlling the Black Widow only reinforced the need for the divide by underscoring the vulnerability of Natasha Romanova. It had taken yelling, tears, and patience on both of their parts to coax Natasha out, and then a whole lot of schooling on Clint's part to get the other agents at SHIELD to greet Natasha with anything other than suspicion or skepticism including Phil himself, he was ashamed to remember. That guilt, along with growing to genuinely like Natasha was why he worked so hard now to help her see her own value, and maybe feel comfortable enough to integrate the two sides of her into one whole, magnificent, and deadly woman.

 

 _He awakens again in much the same state as he did the last time. The pain hasn't really diminished, but it has enough that he knows it is different. That, along with the knowledge that he has done this before, helps him to keep from panicking this time when he is confronted with the hole of nothing in his mind. It's not much, but it's also everything. Because this means that he has a future. Because he has a sense_ of _the future. That just leaves the silence, which is worrisome. Terribly, terribly worrisome, because if he_ is _recovering, then he should be able to hear something. Right?_

 _But he can't, not even his own increasing breaths, but … He goes to bang his hand against something, only it's heavy and covered, and when it does hit something it_ hurts _. That's what gives him the impetus to force open his eyes._

_He recognizes the place – the kind of place – as a hospital bay, with a light that has been dimmed enough so it doesn't blind him. A curtain has been drawn for privacy. He's got a cast on his left wrist up to his knuckles; that's what he hit, but of more interest to him is that he'd automatically used his left hand. It's not because three of his fingers on his right are splinted and taped together or that it also has the cannula for two IVs inserted on the back; he still didn't feel anything from there and wouldn't have known without seeing what had been done._

_Something to put in his_ me _tally. He is left handed._

 _Rails have been raised alongside his bed but he is not restrained to them. Something he realizes he'd subconsciously been expecting. Even as he is thinking that, he knows this is a ghost of a memory. He doesn't know if it is from before or_ before _, however, so he's not sure if it counts._

_What he doesn't see is somebody – anybody – sitting at his side. He feels like there should be, like there usually is._

_Wait. Usually?_

_Usually implies more than once, implies regularly enough to feel an absence._

_Now he takes a look at the skin he can see, then carefully plucks at the neck of the gown he's been dressed in for some of the skin that has been covered. Sure enough, there are scars, too many to be from a simple injury. Some very faint and therefore old, as well as some visible enough that they were either rather serious or rather recent._

_A life of action then. Of violence._

_For just a moment, he gets a flicker of staring at someone in the distance. The figure drops like a puppet with its strings cut. He feels a sense of … not pleasure. No, it is satisfaction. As if the fall had somehow been at his hand. He's horrified, as then the pleasure comes, although he reaches for more anyway. The memory stalls. Not before he feels as if the pleasure hadn't come directly from what he'd done, but instead from someone else's … acknowledgement of his actions. From someone else's … praise?_

_He reaches again, but there is nothing more for him to grasp. He knows something else new about himself, however._

_At one point, there was someone. Someone who was proud of what he did. Someone who cared about him when he hurt._

_Acknowledging that absence hurts more than his injuries. As it isn't something he can answer though, he puts it aside. The ease in which he_ can _, tells him he's been left behind before._

_It doesn't matter. It is the physical pain he should be considering._

_His head is pounding abominably, he cannot hear, and he's lost his memories. So concussion, check. His breathing is ragged, not just from his mental exertions given the ache in his throat and across his chest, so overall bruising. No broken ribs, because all of that would hurt more, but both of his hands are fucked up. A car accident seems a reasonable explanation. One that he was in, rather than hit by, otherwise one leg or both would be fucked up too._

_Maybe his companion was in the car with him? Had they been injured too and that was why he was alone?_

_Finding that out seemed more important than anything. Even with the cast limiting most of the mobility of his fingers, he twists and removes the IV lines, then starts to sit up. Recognizing he knew how to do that slows him more than the nausea and dizziness do, until he feels a pull against his arm that has him flailing. Throwing up on the male nurse might be overkill for being so badly startled, but when he then feels a new pressure on his arm and his sight immediately starts to dim to match the sudden lethargy in his body, he has a moment of fleeting disappointment that he hadn't had lunch earlier so that he'd upchucked more._

With a kind of giddy satisfaction, Phil pressed the #2 speed dial button on his phone. With his other hand he accepted the bag from the woman selling cheese at the market, the one that had been left behind by the man she had easily identified as Clint. Though he pressed it upon her, she refused to take any money and Phil demurred and instead thanked her. He wished he could ask if her refusal was out of kindness for the unfortunate young man who had run into trouble, or because she had feared who that young man had been caught talking with after making his purchase at her stall. While she'd been free with her gossip about the most exciting thing she'd witnessed in quite some time, Kosovo had only been five years previous, and the SRS still held sway with as many followers as there were people who feared them.

He thanked her again and stepped back upon hearing Natasha's hello.

"He was arrested." Phil's disbelief softened the German his cover required, just as Natasha's Romanian cover made her voice sound shrill when she asked:

" _What did that_ nătărău _do?_ "

Her tone also held anger, something Phil didn't think was an act and, therefore, something he needed to rectify immediately.

"Nothing that was his fault, Niculina. It appears that Dimitrije Jevđević has been under investigation by the SBPOK. Today is the day they chose to arrest Jevđević, just as he was exchanging pleasantries with the _nice young man_ who worked with Jevđević at the Coca Cola plant."

"Să mori tu! _Only Franz._ "

Only Clint, indeed. Or Franz, in this case, as Clint cover was an ex-pat German like Phil.

" _Lukas, the SBPOK, though? If Jevđević is part of the_ Srpska Mafija _, Franz is not going to just talk his way out of this._ "

Phil hadn't really thought that far ahead, but Natasha was right. Under Milošević's presidency, he'd employed many members of the Serbian Mafia in his government and military, and the current government was still working on rooting the corruption out. If the SBPOK had left Jevđević alone long enough for the locals to casually know he was a mobster, they were after his contacts. Such as Franz Bartz.

" _I think a call to his uncle Nickolaus is in order._ "

Phil nodded, although Natasha wasn't nearby to see, nor had she really meant this needed to go all the way up to Fury. Phil could handle the call on his own, once he was back at the safe house. Serbia was an EU candidate and, therefore, subscribed to the WSC guidelines when it came to SHIELD. He'd simply contact the SHIELD liaison inside the government and get Clint released, although he'd have to be careful not to blow his own or Clint's cover.

As much as Phil applauded the Serbian effort to clean house, the matter of whether Doomstadt was behind the wave of stolen Stark Tech that had been showing up in the hands of some of the new terrorist groups was of much more importance to SHIELD. Not that they'd figured out much beyond which group of Serbian pirates had been acting as the middle men. Unfortunately, Jevđević was not one of the pirates, as they could have used Clint's arrest with him as the way into the local gang they needed.

"Go home, Niculina. I'll meet you there soon."

 

_This time when he awakens, the male nurse is sitting at his bedside, reading a magazine. A Russian one and, hey, he recognizes Russian. The nurse looks up when he moves, stands, and takes the time to point his finger in warning before he goes to the door –_

_That's another new thing; he's been moved to a room._

_The nurse doesn't leave, however. Instead, someone else comes in, someone who looks official, not like a doctor or a hospital administrator. The uniform, walk and stance screams police, though he doesn't recognize the uniform. It looks vaguely military, but that's all he can come up with._

_He closes his eyes for a moment and tries to imagine himself as a soldier. It doesn't feel right. Neither does keeping his eyes closed when someone who has the power to detain him is in the room with him. Of course the nurse had already shown him the ability to do that too, so he turns his glare that way first, before giving his attention to the cop._

_It's when the cop opens his mouth that he realizes he is well and truly fucked. He can't hear the other man's words. So he is deaf then, really, truly deaf, because he catches himself trying to read the other's lips. If he knows how to do that, the deafness isn't just the result of his recent accident._

_"I can't hear you. I don't know what you are saying," he says himself, and counts his blessing that the men in with him don't flinch – or strain. It seems that not only has he been deaf long enough that he thinks he should be able to lip read, but he also knows how to modulate his voice when he speaks._

_He's learning all sorts of things about himself. Too bad none of it looks like it's going to help him._

_"I … " No, admitting that he's deaf is dangerous. Better the cop thinks it's just his head injury. So that's where he points and then shrugs._

_The cop doesn't look happy. Neither does the nurse when the cop turns that way._

_He tries to read the nurse's words and has no better luck, although he's pretty sure the nurse isn't speaking Russian. How he knows that … What language had he just spoken himself? The words had come automatically, but when he reaches for more, there are too many. Dver, porta, door, puerta, tür, uşă …_

_Great. He speaks several languages, and he doesn't know which one is his native one. He closes his eyes again and tries to forget what he's seen, instead just letting his mind go blank so that he might listen to the words in his own thoughts. Those words are … English, which narrows down his origins to a handful of countries he supposes. He's pretty damn certain the others aren't speaking English, however, and admitting that he does seems just as dangerous as admitting he's deaf. He's seen those movies, the ones that paint the horrors of being arrested in a foreign country._

_Someone touches him. His eyes fly open but he reacts without needing to see, his body moving through muscle memory to counter the sudden threat. Even with a cast on one of his hands, the threat is quickly put down, the second one as easy as the first. It's then that he remembers simply throwing up the first time; wants to throw up again when he discovers he's attack the cop as well as his nurse._

_Not good, not good, notgood!_

_They're not dead, though, which is something. But he's starting to question the validity of those movies he vaguely remembered. Either he really has a thing for prison movies, or some of those things he remembers are his own memories of prison and torture. Which might very well explain some of his scars, but he would rather not add to either collection: memories or scars. Which means he needs to get the fuck out of here, before someone else comes in and finds the two men he overpowered._

_A life of violence indeed._

 

Phil wanted very much to throw his phone as he hung up, but managed to refrain. He did repeat the curse the Serbian liaison had used, however, as she imparted the news she'd received from the SBPOK: _Da Bog dobio gljivice na jajima_!

"I hope you get fungus on your balls? That does not sound like Clint will be coming home soon," Natasha said as she entered the office, two plates of moussaka in her hands. "He is not dead?"

Phil shook his head.

"Then there is time to eat. Especially if the next meal is just as uncertain this one turned out to be."

All very logical and pragmatically Russian, though Phil could see the curiosity in her eyes. Only because she was allowing him to, of course. Phil wasn't particularly hungry, given the acid that had been churning in his stomach over the last hour, but he nodded and accepted the plate with a word of thanks.

"It is I who should be thanking you, for going to the bother," she returned, raising her plate like a salute before dropping down onto one of the chairs across from him and pulling up her feet to the seat until she could use her knees to rest her plate while she ate. "What has happened now?"

Phil scowled. "The SBPOK vehicle was ambushed on its way to headquarters. Jevđević, Clint and one additional prisoner were liberated by a quartet of masked gunmen. It was a very clean, very efficient operation. Which is why Liasion Paspalj had thought it was us, having our own use for Jevđević."

"Did she at least identify which Clan Jevđević is working with?" she asked, thinking no doubt, as Phil was, how screwed they might be.

There was the Serbian mafia, the Serbian pirates, and then many, many familial-based criminal organizations that each claimed their own territories like street gangs back in the US. That didn't take into account Croatian or old Yugoslav interests who would like nothing more than to disrupt Serbian sovereignty.

"Ms. Paspalj did, but she is certain it wasn't Jevđević people. They wouldn't have left the SBPOK officers alive."

"A rival clan, then, or someone like Von Doom who cannot afford to have a useful tool or ally like Jevđević locked up. That is a very big haystack, Phil," she said solemnly.

"One I cannot see being able to find the needle in without blowing the mission." Phil felt sick. He stopped eating the moussaka before he actually was sick.

There was only one call the Hub Field Operations Oversight would make. Strike Team Delta's missions no longer included onsite support or back-up because the WSC had become budget conscious over wasting resources. Hawkeye and the Black Widow hadn't needed assistance at any time during their last nine missions so they were now 'trusted' to extract themselves if something went south. ; The consequence of being at the top of their game.

Instead of showing an expression of dismay and frustration that matched how Phil felt, Natasha looked hesitant.

"I think I can narrow our search if you will let me."

"Natasha?"

Phil didn't think he'd ever heard her sound so small or vulnerable, at least not outside a role she might put on for a mark. She hadn't even played this card when the WSC had made it clear they didn't approve of bringing her in and that they expected their kill order to be completed. It was because of that, mostly, that he felt confident she wasn't playing him right now. fI he was wrong yet it still led to finding Clint, Phil wasn't sure he still wouldn't find the action acceptable.

"There are … people who know the Black Widow now works for SHIELD," Natasha stated and the pause told him she wasn't talking about the WSC, other SHIELD agents, or anyone, really, that SHIELD would be happy to know had that knowledge.

"Some of them, however … "

This time her pause didn't disappear under more words, and a flush overtook her fair, pale complexion. Phil couldn't help but marvel at what he was being offered. Natasha _never_ let her body betray her with something as simple as a blush.

"It's okay, Natasha. We trust you."

She gave a short, decisive nod, any anger she might have displayed being directed at herself for her nerves. "Several of those people also know that the Widow is playing the long game with her defection. They know she only works for herself, and that SHIELD's secrets will someday be sold or laid bare. Clint … " Again, she hesitates, but only for a second or two.

"Clint has perhaps helped in keeping these rumors alive," she blurted out, almost as one long, single word.

Well, that certainly explained her embarrassment and anxiety. There were a few SHIELD agents still decrying the same thing despite or perhaps because of Specialist Romanoff's successes and the blood she'd shed for their cause. One or two WSC members still thought so too, from how Fury sometimes vented in front of him and Maria. What Phil wasn't sure of was which guilt she thought would disturb him more: being a person who still took advantage of those rumors or because she'd co-opted Clint into helping her.

He might not know her quite well enough, but he certainly knew Clint.

"It was Clint's idea, wasn't it?"

She looked startled then rueful, no doubt over underestimating him, although that was the basis of Phil's own reputation. Harmless, average, a nobody.

"It is expected for all field agents to maintain covers that can work alongside the worst of the people we fight, Natasha. It is mandatory for field agents leveled four and above, even me," he added when she raised one lovely eyebrow skeptically.

"Ask Clint one day about Coulman Everett," he offered. "Or better yet, ask Maria Hill, because she won't exaggerate any of it."

Now she looked intrigued, but also confused.

"There are lines that SHIELD draws, and lines that each agent has to discover for themselves so they can live with themselves. We tell ourselves we're serving the greater good, but it's normal to have doubts. And to sometimes cross at least one of those lines. Have you never wondered why assets such as you and Clint still have handlers when you proved, long before you joined SHIELD, that you functioned exceptionally well as an independent?"

"To make sure we are working to SHIELD's interests," she answered with no trace of that confusion or any doubts.

Phil closed his eyes for a moment and then opened them and gave her a smile. He really needed not to fuck this up.

"Well yes, but it is not as cut and dried as you think. Beyond helping facilitate whatever you need and keep an eye on the big picture, a handler is another pair of eyes – or ears – for when there are political, moral, or ethical issues at play. Sometimes we're another shoulder to carry the burden. Or the blame."

"Like bringing in a Soviet agent instead of completing the kill order."

Of course she would jump directly to that, instead of something like Prague, and the young child who'd been used as a trigger to a bomb that would have taken out a peace conference. Clint had made the shot, but Phil had been the one to tell him to take it, so that Clint wouldn't have to carry that guilt alone.

"I wish I could say yes to that, but that was all Clint's doing. I'm afraid I was one of those who couldn't see what he did and supported you being put down," he admitted. "Fortunately, Nick was the one who'd brought Clint in originally, and so he was the who stepped up and took responsibility for Clint's actions when then Director Malick and the WSC had their collective mutant kittens."

Natasha's eyes widened in dismay. Not from his admission as it turned out, however.

"Do you mean to say that Clint will forever be held accountable for my actions?"

Phil immediately shook his head. "I'm sorry that that was your takeaway. If there are circumstances were you deviate from orders, that will be on you – or your team, as I see it unlikely that we'd let you go off and do something stupid on your own. Fury had reasons beyond a weird fondness for Clint to champion your employment. That decision was key to him getting the directorship when Malick stepped down to take a seat on the WSC."

She still wasn't convinced. "I do not like the thought of yours or Clint's own future being held hostage to my behavior."

Well, Rome wasn't built in a day. "It's a risk we are happy to take, Natasha," he told her, giving her the answer she still needed to hear. "Clint is certainly willing to take credit for all of your successes, so it's only fair that he also shares in your failures."

She looked better, but not fully satisfied.

He tried again.

"Fine. If you like, then I will say, don't do anything that calls his faith in you into question. Will what you're thinking about doing now to find him jeopardize that, Agent Romanoff?

She shook her head and offered him a small, contented smile. "Do you know Silver Sablinova?"

"I know she is the CEO of Silver Sable Industries, whose home base is in Aniana, but I have never had the pleasure."

Natasha's smile widened into a grin. "She is also a member – the leader of the mercenary group known as the Wild Pack. Her codename is Silver Sable. If there is any concerted activities going on near Symkaria or Latveria, she will know. She has been cultivating the Widow in hopes of becoming friends. I will have to give her something, of course, for the information on who snatched Jevđević. Would you help me determine what piece of information SHIELD is willing to give up?"

"I would be happy to."

 

_He is extremely thankful it isn't winter. The streets are full with other people so he doesn't stick out and isn't going to freeze his balls off while he tries to find shelter or … something._

_Getting out of his hospital room had been easy – child's play, actually – which again speaks to a past he isn't sure he isn't better off not knowing. He's also been lucky in that his clothes had been left in his room, as stealing a cop's uniform is never a good idea, and the nurse's scrubs would have only serve him inside the hospital but would be too noticeable on the streets. Unfortunately, his wallet had been missing, along with any kind of identification, which might be a problem beyond not giving him his name. Depending on what country he is in, he might need papers._

Papers? We don't need no stinking papers!

_His clothes are common enough, good, sturdy work pants and a long-sleeve flannel shirt, that he looks no different from the people moving around him and won't attract any sort of unwanted attention._

"I look like a farmer!"

"You look like a good proletariat worker, Comrade Yastreb. Would you rather look like an arty East Village type?"

 _Even if he doesn't need papers, he's going to need money. Tips left on tables as he passes an open air café gives him some, although he's careful not to take all of the money from any table; better the waiters to think their customers are skinflint then to suspect a thief is in their midst. He also feels some guilt for taking what he_ _knows_ _is hard earned money –_

"Why in the hell did you give her such a good tip? The service was terrible."

"You saying you'd do any better, Garrett, if you had to handle ten tables full of customers by yourself? Any owner too cheap or broke to hire enough people to run a shift is only going to pay his workers the minimum he has to in order to keep them. Any woman of her age who is working in a diner like this is here because she doesn't have any other choices – "

"She can always – "

"Don't you fucking say it, Ward. Jesus, you can be such a dick. Garrett, maybe you should send the rookie undercover in a place like this. With that kind of attitude he wouldn't last a day."

_He looks for a tourist who might be careless with their phone. Only to realize that even if he did remember someone to call, he doesn't remember a number. Nor does he have enough information to tell them how to come find him, and it's not like any phone he's going to find is going to have voice to text capabilities. He should write a letter of complaint to Stark Industries._

_Instead he simply takes the map that's tucked under the phone._

_He slips away from the tables and finds a street vendor selling kabobs to satisfy the hunger the smells from the café triggered. Noticing a small park a street over, he heads there to eat and check his bounty._

_Most of the money is Euros, but then he's already figured out he's somewhere in Europe – somewhere in the Balkans going by the mountains he can see in the distance._

_Shit. He hopes it isn't Latveria._

_It isn't. The map tells him he's in_ Aniana, _but the name doesn't trigger anymore of the stealth memories he's been experiencing since his escape from the hospital, doesn't even prompt a corresponding country of origin out of the random facts that just come to him, like knowing he doesn't want to be in Latveria even if he doesn't have any idea why that would be a Bad Thing._

_He sighs in disappointment, despite the memories distracting him from his immediate concerns._

_There is likely an American Embassy somewhere here, but if he's a criminal, throwing himself on their mercy will likely just end up with him back under lock and key; something that he'd really like to avoid. He could also actually be British, or a citizen of some other English speaking country, as names like Garrett and Ward are generically Anglo. He is already going to have enough of a chore communicating with someone to add asking for help from the wrong Embassy._

_He looks back over his surroundings, trying to figure out what to do next. He's put himself at least a mile away from the hospital, but he should increase the distance. He will need more money to find a defensible place to crash for the night, as he doesn't think he's going to be able to stay awake until morning. The ease in which he lifted money from tables gives him the idea he might be able to pick a pocket or two, but he's not sure the risk is worth it. It would be better to find a way to turn what money he has into more; gambling or three-card monte, or … juggling?_

_Well, that's novel. Hell, none of those things are part of a normal person's skillset, not if he's certain he can make money doing them. So even more information to fill in who he is, except it's just as random as the facts he never lost. He is already so fucking tired of this._

_Actually, he's just feeling tired. And sore._

_The one problem with an easy escape from a hospital is that the reason it is easy is because they don't expect someone who needs treatment to try. While it's not like he's going to die from not staying there, his discomfort is increasing as his pain medication wears off. The headache is the worst, and is only being exacerbated by the steady tension of keeping watch to compensate for not being able to hear._

_He has to take a break and get some sleep._

"Clint is in Symkaria," Natasha called out as soon as the door closed behind her. "Well, he was, and most likely still is," she hedged as Phil came out of the office to meet her.

He gestured for her to continue.

She moved into the small kitchen first, and began putting away the groceries that had still needed to be bought if they were going to continue on here after retrieving Clint.

"The Wild Pack was behind attack on the SBPOK vehicle," she told him as he followed and they began working together to deal with the supplies. "Jevđević had been supplying them information on Croat subversives who are looking to destabilize the region again. They didn't want to lose their conduit."

She gave a shrug off of Phil's frown, her countenance carefully neutral which meant she didn't necessarily disagree with Silver Sable's actions. As if she was reminding Phil that if it had been SHIELD who'd disrupted the arrest, there would be no moral ambiguity in Phil's mind. He decided to take that as a positive that she'd absorbed more of what he'd been trying to say earlier than he'd thought. The Natasha of just yesterday wouldn't have been so willing to express what might be construed as disappointment in him, not knowing that she _could_.

The bigger win in Phil's mind, however, was in what he was not seeing. Natasha looking blank as it would have been if she had something truly awful to impart.

So Phil breathed a little easier and tried not to give in to his impatience and goad her into telling him what he wanted to hear. No doubt she felt he _needed_ to hear the rest of this first. Ongoing active efforts to destabilize the region was certainly useful information to SHIELD, even if he couldn't see how it affected them in the short term, other than how it had deprived them of Clint.

"Jevđević, not knowing who had him this time, tried to spread the blame between all three suspects, so all three were _helped_ into the van that then headed to the border for Symkaria " she resumed with a nod of approval so faint, that Phil could easily convince himself he'd imagined it.

"Only the third suspect didn't know Jevđević and did not want to go to Symkaria. As they approached the border station, he pushed through the opening between the back and front of the van to attack the driver in attempt to convince him to stop. All he managed was to cause an accident, which ended up with all seven of the occupants being taken to the hospital in Aniana to be treated."

Phil tried to remind himself that she didn't look worried and she wasn't acting as if they needed to leave immediately. Still … "Clint – "

She softened her expression. "Of course, I am sorry. He is mostly fine," she tried to reassure him. "According to his doctor's report, he did break his wrist when his handcuffs snapped, along with a few fingers."

More likely he'd snapped the cuff himself. If he hadn't come into contact with the Wild Pack or Silver Sable during his own mercenary days, he wouldn't have known whose hands he'd fallen into, and with someone else drawing the attention, Phil could see him taking the opportunity to affect his own escape."

"Clint also sustained a concussion during the crash, which is what Silver attributes as to why Clint attacked his nurse and the security officer who was trying to interview him, before escaping from the hospital. You have trained him well."

Phil sputtered and then huffed when he caught her teasing smile. It was easier to laugh and hold onto the pride that Clint had managed to extract himself from a tenuous situation, even if it put them back to square one. In a city Phil didn't know and one where he had absolutely no contacts. Symkaria had not signed the WSC Accords, so SHIELD had no local contact, much less any presence. Nor could they expect any governmental cooperation. While he might be able to trade for such cooperation, SHIELD wasn't about to let him.

"The politia were looking for him, but I pointed out that next time Clint might not leave their officer alive, not if he thinks he's under attack and in enemy hands. Silver agreed and has called them off, willing to leave it to us to find him."

"Who does she think he is? Or who I am?"

"She knows you are SHIELD, and thinks that Clint is an unnamed mercenary on your watch list. She is willing to let him go as long as you will let her keep Jevđević in play. I said that yes, we were."

"That's fine," Phil said. Jevđević was a little fish, and Clint's cover already had some sketchiness in his background, so any new rumors shouldn't affect its usefulness. More worrisome was that both the Serbian security forces and now the Symkarian ones had Clint's face and fingerprints on file. SHIELD had purged that information from the FBI, CIA, and Interpol when he'd first come in with them, just as they had more recently done so with Natasha's. He would have to devise a new set of fingerprints and photo for Paspalj to substitute in Franz Bartz's file, but he had no leverage with Ms. Sablinova.

"We are fortunate that Silver never saw Clint in person. For those of her men that did interact with him directly, we can hope that they found Jevđević and the other man more memorable."

Natasha shrugged after saying that because they wouldn't know until they talked to Clint themselves, just how well he'd been able to maintain his cover.

"We are more fortunate that Silver had also invited me to meet her for breakfast at Castle Silver tomorrow morning. I will make sure I have the opportunity to gain access to and destroy all of the information her people and the Symkarian police gathered while Clint was in their custody," Natasha then echoed Phil's thoughts aloud.

"Unless you wish to come along and take care of it yourself while I instead provide the distraction? I only ask because you are a distinctive man, because of your normalcy, and she will remember you. Although, so far, Silver's work mostly benefits the side of the angels – or at least does not impede that side – you must know that her only loyalties are to her country and to her men. She is not afraid to work with demons to achieve what she sees as necessary ends. For the right prize, she would sell out her lover."

"Would it be useful for you to have me there?"

Natasha shook her head. "I will have no difficulties. I think it would be better if you spend your morning looking for Clint. If anyone has the chance of figuring out what he will do in a strange city with no contacts, it will be you, not me."

Phil was concerned that she was putting too much faith in him, but they didn't exactly have a choice. The one thing he did know was that Clint wouldn't return here to the safe house, at least not until he figured out if his arrest and subsequent journey north had put Natasha, Phil, or the mission in danger.

 

 _A night full of restless dreams has convinced him he isn't alone in the world. He dreamt of a man and woke up hard and aching, much to his surprise. It isn't that he's concerned about being gay. Well, he supposes he will have to be careful he doesn't out himself in any manner before he finds out which Balkan country Aniana resides within. It's just that he'd also had a dream earlier than the one about the man who left him_ wanting _, involving a knockout of a woman in a much more intimate scenario. He would write that one off to a fantasy, but even now as he tries to hold onto her and fails, what he can remember are feelings of warmth and pleasure, of love, though not the same form of love that flows through him with thoughts of the subsequent man._

_Could she be his sister and the man his lover?_

_He's pretty sure the memory of her in his dream did not have her looking anything like the image he'd seen in the broken mirror hanging in the shitter he'd found last night. Sister still feels close if not exactly right. He actually gets nothing if he thinks about family directly: his father, his mother, a sis –_

Don't worry little brother. We're going to be fine. We don’t need any more family than each other.

_Not a sister but a brother. Only the feelings he gets in reaching for his brother are pain and betrayal. Memories he thinks he locks up even when he does have access to them._

_He decides to call her sister anyway, just so he can keep something of her until he gets a better memory. He repeats sister and sees the color red, sees blood, but also a fiery mane of red hair and so sister gets the name Red in his mind, which makes him happy._

_Instead of a color for the man, he hears words. Hears:_ talk to me _, along with feelings of safety and trust. Voice is a lousy name, though, and it's only as he's trying to turn something like voice into a name in another language, that he realizes how odd it is for him to associate thinking about hearing anything with anyone. This means he hasn't always been deaf. He should have recognized this before now. Almost all of his recovering memories have involved someone else talking along with his own words._

_Well, that just reinforces the decision he'd come to as he left the abandoned building he'd found and broken into last night. He's going to try a phone today. Between taking out a cop, picking a few careless pockets, and finding a perch up in some rafters that he felt safe and comfortable enough to sleep on along with so many other little things, he hasn't lost his muscle memory. So he might be able to dial the right numbers as long as he doesn't actually try to remember them as he's doing it._

_If he does get them wrong, well, it's not like he'll be able to identify himself to become embarrassed. Even assuming he dials a valid number at all._

_Of course, he's also not going to know if he's successful unless he sees Red. Or the man who is his haven –_

_Haven is Gavan' in Russian, and that's as good a name as any for his mystery man. Gavan'_

_Okay, so if he does manage to call Red or Gavan', what is he going to do if they live or are visiting America or Australia or somewhere_ not here _? He can't wait around indefinitely, not even the few days it might take them to arrange things if they are as close as Anglo-speaking England. While he does have a sense that either of them would come if he asked, regardless, every moment he is free, he is also that much closer to getting caught and incarcerated. If he's a criminal, then it is also likely at least one of them is too, which means he could be drawing them into a trap._

_He'll have to be clever. And so fucking lucky._

The last thing Phil expected to hear is his phone ringing with that particular ring. With Natasha across from him as they shared a light lunch, no one else had his direct number outside of a few people who also worked at SHIELD. Of those people, not even Jasper or Maria would call him in a middle of a mission. Not even Nick.

Actually, he could only think of one person who would be calling –

"Talk to me," he said as he answered it, falling back on procedure to keep from being overwhelmed by hope.

For the longest few seconds of Phil's life, there was nothing. Then:

" _Please don't hang up_ ," Clint said on the other end, the mixture of hope and desperation in his tone apparent even over the echoing flatness of the line. He spoke English, but then Phil had first, without even realizing it.

Phil slumped down in his chair, not caring how unprofessional it made him appear. Natasha, he knew, would share his relief after all. As far as the agents Silver Sable had watching them, the more reason to report on how inept Phil was at his job, the better that would serve any future interactions. Already she had to be thinking he was Natasha's tool – a lackey instead of her technical superior.

"Never. I promise," Phil told Clint, staying with English and letting everything he felt for the younger man color his tone. "Are you alright?"

Natasha allowed herself a small smile as she correctly interpreted from Phil's words and body language the identity of the caller. It was she, after all, who was the one really under observation right now. Either as a role model, or as a potential rival.

Another long, agonizing pause followed.

" _Listen, I understand this is going to sound weird, but I can't really tell whether I'm talking to someone on the other line. I'm only hoping that it's you. What I'm asking may sound insane, even if you are the right person. Maybe we haven't spoken to one another in years, but I have to hope because it's all that I've got right now –_ "

Phil felt the adrenalin flood his system. Something more than just a bad phone or phone line was going on. "You can't hear me?" he tried, but there was no pause in Clint's plea.

 _" – I'm in Aniana, which I'm counting on meaning something to you. Counting on you being here too, I guess. For the next two hours, I will be outside the library located on the_ Bulevardul Gallatik _. The one with the two lions out front. I will go there if I can during this same time for the next three days. If I don't see you during any of these times, it's okay, I'll figure something else out. But I'm really hoping I won't have to. I need you to know that if this really is you, even if the last time we saw one another we were screaming at each other, hell, if we were shooting at each other, I still and will always love you. It just feels really important that I say that before I say goodbye. If it's not you, none of this is going to matter, other than I promise you I won't bother you again._ "

Natasha had already signaled for the check by the time Phil admitted that Clint had hung up. He could only imagine what his expression looked like though it couldn't express even a tenth of the horror he was feeling.

"Do you know how far we are from _Bulevardul Gallatik_? From the library with the lions in front of it?"

Natasha nodded slowly, warily. "It is just over a kilometer from here. We can walk it in almost the same amount of time it would take finding a taxi to take us there. Is he – "

"Something is most certainly wrong. The doctor reported a concussion. Were you able to find out how bad of one? Do they even use a concussion grading scale in this part of the world?" Even as he asked, he knew he was trying to distract himself with irrelevant data.

"Not as you Americans do. All the doctor's report indicated was the concussion. He hadn't had the time to finish his assessment before his patient fled," she answered him anyway, reaching across to put her hand atop his shaking one that still clutched at the phone. "What do we need to do?"

"Other than get to the library, I don't know. I don't think he really has any understanding of where he is."

"While even a mild concussion can produce post-traumatic amnesia, it is most often fleeting," she reminded him. "Some of it may be circumstance, a little confusion or something triggered by the second police officer. I imagine when he sees you, and perhaps even me, he will not be so … wrong?"

Phil nodded, letting her think he was upset because Clint simply sounded off. She didn't need to know that Clint had thought he was saying a final goodbye. It wasn't like Phil's objectivity hadn't shattered along with his heart, after all, and one of them needed to remain sensible as long as they were in a foreign country and involved in a potentially hostile situation.

She took his arm as they started walking, tucking herself close, both offering and seeking comfort. Of course he hadn't fooled her, she had been trained all her life to see through men's egos and the lies they told themselves, and was undisputedly the best student the Red Room had ever produced.

"I can't decide if you are good or bad for my ego," he complained, shaking his head as he looked down at her.

She grinned impishly before resting her head against his shoulder. For a moment Phil could only wonder what the people around them were thinking, with him being almost twice her age, but as she began speaking, he realized he didn't care in the slightest, not even in the face of what Silver Sable's intel would note.

"I am both, therefore I am perfect," she teased. "While you are normally very good at being very hard to read, you let down your guard around me. Just as you are showing me how to let down my guard around you."

Some of the dread that still clutched too tightly to Phil had to give way to the wonder and humility her words brought him.

"I think we both owe him for that," she added, her voice turning wistful. "I also think I am now ready to tell him so, but only because of you. It is nice that he does not see the Widow, but sometimes it is also very confusing. You will tell me what I need to hear, even if you do not believe the words you say, so I think I must admit to trusting you both to … do right by me. I will not allow either of us to lose him."

Phil couldn't help but lean down and kiss the top of her head, wishing it was the usual, vibrant red instead of the dark, nearly black dye she'd applied for the mission, even though he had no doubt he was truly seeing Natalia now, the woman she would have been without the Red Room and the darkness that inhabited their world. Something was definitely shifting between them. Maybe it already had been, and Clint's disappearance had only brought it into focus as his presence was no longer a buffer between them. Phil was certain that he and Natasha could work together now, just the two of them, should the need ever arise; that the trust between them went both ways and was something more evolved like the bonds he'd forged with Maria, Jasper, Vic, and John.

It _could_ be just the two of them, but not today. "I won't either," he promised.

 

From even a block away, Phil noticed the library before Natasha had a chance to point it out. They both started walking quicker, and then both seemed to realize the wrongness in such an action so that they made an effort to slow their advance in synch, without either of them needing to tug on the other. Moving blindly into an unknown situation was a damn good way to get someone killed. While Phil had no concern about walking into Clint's crosshairs, remembering how spooked Clint's voice had sounded as well as how wary, it might not just be Clint who had wanted him here.

"He called you, so you should be the one he sees," With her words, Natasha started pulling a scarf from the pocket of the light jacket she'd acquired sometime after their arrival in Symkaria. Guiding Phil to follow her into the recess of a doorway under the pretense of showing him a significantly overpriced Rolex, even for being a local knock-off, she began the transformation back into the mousy Niculina Sala, the Romanian immigrant, by first turning her coat inside out to a patchwork instead of the smart fashion she'd been wearing, then tying the scarf around her head.

Her body language changed entirely too. She shrank into an even tinier woman with a perpetual hunch from how life had beaten her down. There weren't as many war victims here in Symkaria as there had been in Serbia, but Niculina was certainly not the only one out along the streets of Aniana.

The transformation wouldn't fool Silver Sable's people, if there really was a team following them, but then it wasn't supposed to. It might also be unnecessary, but taking proper precautions was never a waste of time.

"How long do you intend to wait for him to come to you?" Natasha asked as they returned to the boulevard although now with an appropriate distance between them. She still spoke quiet English, which was disconcerting hearing it come from Niculina's face.

It was such a joy to work with someone who knew and saw the same world that he did, someone he didn't have to spend half of his time in explanations for his orders or correcting their spy craft. Natasha knew as well as he did that Clint wouldn't simply be waiting in front of the library for the possibility that someone would show up. Clint was a long-distance man, whether he was working as back-up or as primary. In these circumstances, he would have found himself a perch somewhere above street level, somewhere he had sightlines on the library and a lessened chance of someone spotting him in return.

"He said he'd wait for two hours for me, so I will do the same for him."

"Do you want me to find him?"

Phil shook his head. "If we need to after the two hours, we'll pool our guesses as to where he went to ground and check them out, but I don't want to scare him into taking off." Not when he might do so even without feeling hunted. Clint had given Phil three days to get here, and if he was feeling paranoid enough, Clint wasn't going to come out of hiding without making his own observations.

"We might have to do this again tomorrow or the day after. Will Ms. Sablinova extend her largesse to encompass that?"

They were, all three of them, here in Symkaria without valid passports or visas. It would only take Sable's word to her national security force to have them deported or even jailed.

"Silver is not yet ready to cut ties with the Widow," Natasha assured him. "If something does change, I trust her enough that she will tell me first so that she might make a game of it to prove she is better."

Not exactly a ringing endorsement, but then those didn't exist in their world. The game, however … Hell, they all played it in one way or the other. Judging yourself against your rivals was often the only measure when so much of what they did wouldn't see fruition or failure for months or years.

"Are you going to be in danger from our lost sparrow?" she then asked.

Phil shook his head. "He's scared, but he still trusts me. If he won't come in, I believe it will only be because he's making sure there is no trap. For our behalf as well as his own."

She nodded, tucking something into the pocket of his coat before patting his hand. "I will meet you then in two hours in the lobby of the library, or if you signal me sooner. Until then, I have your back."

He refrained from checking what she'd given him; it was too light to be a gun. It had also been done too smoothly for him to ruin the effect by questioning. Instead he simply nodded in return. In the next instant, Natasha was gone, swallowed by the crowd, leaving him to walk the final half mile with heavy steps but a lighter heart in knowing he wasn't facing this alone. It was as he reached the last few feet that he realized he should have better thought things through instead of rushing off headlong.

He had no reason to loiter on the steps of the library, certainly not for two hours.

But he got lucky. A busker was playing the violin on the bottom step and already had a small crowd gathered around him. Phil joined the crowd, moving slowly through it until he reached the nearest lion. There was enough space for him to lean against it and keep his face in profile to the street and the locations most likely where Clint waited. Now he went ahead and removed what turned out to be the remains of their lunch that Natasha had had the foresight to gather and wrap in a napkin.

It was one thing to know that she was a better agent than he'd been at her age, and quite another to have to admit she was also a better one than he was now.

So, too, was Clint. Because Phil had been watching and there was no way he would have missed Clint's arrival. Only he had since Clint now stood beside him, despite Phil's feelings and concern, despite the cast on one hand _and_ splinted fingers on the other, which had to be driving Clint crazy from how those injuries would have limited his ability to keep himself safe.

There was a certain wildness around Clint's eyes, in the jitteriness of his body although anyone else would most likely see someone moving to the beat of the music as were many others in the crowd. Phil checked himself from reaching, from touching, wanting to let Clint make the first move. When Clint didn't – didn't move or say anything; wasn't even looking at Phil beyond that first quick meeting of their eyes when Phil recognized he was no longer alone, Phil lost his resolve and extended the napkin holding half of a turkey wrap.

Clint startled, then gave a hoarse "Thanks." In Russian.

That certainly wasn't what Phil had been expecting. None of this was what he'd expected.

"You're welcome," he answered in the same, leaving it open for Clint to say something more, some warning or round-about explanation.

Clint's only response, however, was taking a small bite of the wrap. He still wouldn't look at Phil, which had all of Phil's hackles rising once more.

"Are you alright?"

When Clint ignored him once more, Phil allowed himself to really look at Clint. What he saw had his heart dropping. Clint wasn't wearing his aides. That explained quite a bit and Phil didn't want to think about how it had to have been, awakening alone in a strange room and an unknown city, unable to hear and, therefore, unable to trust.

Raising his arm slowly, telegraphing the move given Clint's extraordinary situational awareness and eyesight, Phil gently gave a tug on Clint's arm to get his attention. He then signed _talk to me, love._

The tension release from Clint's body like a balloon loosing air. He allowed himself to slump against Phil's body. Were they not in an Eastern European country and one that Phil only knew the most rudimentary information regarding, he would have gathered Clint up into a hug. That opportunity had passed, however; European men could certainly be demonstrative with one another, but only upon first greeting or at a goodbye, without drawing potentially threatening attention.

He could still look his fill, so he watched as some color and humor come back into Clint's expression as Clint arched brow and gestured with his chin to his hands, reminding Phil that he couldn't sign back in response.

Phil smiled sheepishly. _Sorry_ , he signed, and then continued, _she_ _is waiting for us. Are you ready to leave?_ He used Clint's personal sign to identify Natasha, which had never been spider or widow, but instead of mash of fire and grace.

"Red?" Clint asked.

 _I'm sorry?_ Phil responded, not understanding, until Clint lifted his right hand to give an obvious, quick tug on Phil's hair.

 _Yes, Red_ , he confirmed, doing his best to keep from frowning or otherwise alarming Clint; hoping this one time that Clint's ability to see through him just like Clint could anyone else, wasn't a priority.

Clint had never called Natasha Red, as that was too obvious, was too superficial in Clint's mind, especially after so many other agents did exactly that when trying to claim a familiarity they'd never earned. For someone who didn't completely remember Natasha, however, Red made perfect sense.

"Let's go, then," Clint said with a genuine if tired smiled. He pushed himself upright and waited for Phil to do the same.

As they moved down near the violinist, Clint nudged at Phil's arm and showed him a small handful of coins and bills he then gestured with toward the case at the musician's feet. Phil nodded, sensing it was important to Clint, and waited as he knelt down to make sure the coins didn't miss or one of the bills get caught up by the light breeze.

Clint stumbled as he rose back up this time.

For all that Natasha was their true chameleon, they all did a decent job of projecting what they wanted people around them to see, especially when it came to civilians. Looking remarkably vulnerable all the sudden, it was obvious that Clint had been injured recently. Even the bruising covering Clint's right temple seemed more vivid and it took Phil a moment to beat down his panic and remember there had been a couple of butterfly bandages keeping the cut across his cheekbone sutured that were now missing.

Intentionally, fortunately, if Phil had interpreted the wink that Clint gave him as he claimed the right to steady Clint instead of several willing complete strangers.

Whether he was the one looking for comfort, or had at least read enough to see that Phil needed it, didn't matter. Phil thanked those around them for their kindness as he wrapped his arm around Clint's waist, just grateful for the opening he'd been given to keep them together as they moved into the street. They'd barely made it to end of the block before a large taxi pulled up, Natasha visible through the window she was rolling down even as she directed the driver to stop.

Clint still jolted and his eyes widened and then narrowed while he studied Natasha. She allowed it and saw something in Clint's gaze that had her offering a quiet word even Phil couldn't quite make out, but meant something to Clint all the same by the way he relaxed in Phil's hold. She then gave a satisfied nod and pushed the door open, after which she scooted across the seat in obvious invitation for them to join her.

Phil still wasn't going to force the decision onto Clint, not when he was reasonably certain that Clint only recognized them enough to trust he would be safe.

Clint offered no more hesitation however. He reached to steady himself on the door before ducking to join Natasha. Phil followed, surreptitiously sliding his finger from his mouth to his ear in the sign for deaf that only Natasha could see. Her lips thinned momentarily into a frown before upping into a high wattage smile meant for Clint. While she fussed and made sure Clint got settled comfortably, Phil leaned forward and directed the driver to take them to a new hotel than the one he'd stayed in the night before while Natasha had stayed over at Castle Silver.

He'd pick up what little he'd traveled with later; already berating himself for not having thought to bring Clint's spare set of hearing aids.

Natasha chattered like the vacant-headed woman she most assuredly was not, describing a fictitious day spent at some local spa and otherwise entertaining the driver so he wouldn't think it odd that the men with her weren't speaking themselves. It wasn't like the hotel that Phil had picked was far, and while it was more upscale than their covers would have warranted as workers in Belgrade, for such workers to have saved enough to vacation in Symkaria, it should raise no suspicion. He'd already booked them into it while he'd been waiting for Natasha to finish with Sable – only willing to stay in a hotel of their hostess' choosing for a single night -- so only his identification and credit card would be necessary to obtain the keys.

With a honk and a jaunty wave in thanks to the generous tip Niculina's Uncle and chaperon had paid him, the taxi sped off after delivering them to the hotel's doorman. Phil led the way, letting Natasha be the one to keep Clint steady and moving, although he didn't seem to be in quite the same straits as at the library. A quick word about being robbed of their luggage earlier in the day; yes, they'd already filled out the police report; and how kind, they would love to have three house specials sent up so they could dine in their room in a few hours got around the lack of luggage other than Natasha's two large shopping bags as well as Clint's condition and got them into the elevator with nary a hitch or delay.

Once alone, the three of them closed ranks and took to the back corner away from the door, on the off chance someone else might enter as they ascended to the eleventh floor. None of them said anything, Phil at least, out of deference to Clint's inability to hear, while Natasha was likely still operating as if they would be overheard and was unwilling to call attention to Clint's current vulnerability. As for Clint, he'd closed his eyes and was letting the wall and the hand level brass rail encircling the car hold him up, not that either Phil or Natasha would let him collapse.

Their suite was at the end of the short hall that ran perpendicular from the elevator, far enough away that its operation shouldn't keep them awake, once they eventually got some sleep. It also left the bulk of the other rooms on the floor lining along the corridor's other direction, a precaution that was probably unnecessary but also ingrained at this point, although Phil had used the old ruse of a lucky room number for his niece and her fiance when he'd specifically requested it. He had no reason to expect they might be attacked, or even bugged, but that still didn't stop him from pulling out one of R&D's handy null field generators the instant the door closed behind them.

 _It's safe to talk now,_ he signed after Natasha pulled Clint down beside her on the couch that graced the common room between the suites two bedroom.

Natasha held up a hand and then dived into the bottom of one of her shopping bags, pulling out the small case she used as a go bag and had brought with her from their Belgrade safe house. One iris lock later, she was pulling out a small container that she carefully showed Clint after an aborted move to hand it to him. After his gesture of acceptance, she popped it open to then offer Clint a set of hearing aids.

"How long have you carried a back-up pair," Phil had to ask, knowing they weren't the spare pair that he carried and having had no idea she carried one too.

"Ever since we started going out on missions together, " Natasha admitted, as she help Clint fit them in, then signed that the usage was direct neural interfaced; he simply had to think on or off, and controlled volume by thinking soft or loud.

Phil could see the moment the aids worked, but any sense of achievement disappeared when the first thing Clint asked was "Please, what's my name?"

 

_He's been undergoing memory overload upon his first sighting of Gavan' walking toward the library. When Red showed up it had only gotten worse – or maybe he should consider it as getting better – with scenes cascading over one another nearly nonstop. The memories still aren't in any sort of order, nor are they giving him any sort of context to what he's reliving in his mind's eyes, but he is certain now that whoever he is, he knows and trusts these two. So it's no hardship to follow them to a hotel room and trust that they will fill in the blanks in his memories._

_Red offering him a pair of hearing aids is both confirmation of his faith and a godsend. Actually being able to hear something after Red helps him with their operation is a fucking miracle. Certainly how the things work is; this is tech well beyond what practical knowledge he had maintained, the stuff of science fiction. The control it gives him back over his life would bring him to tears (though it doesn't seem that he's the overly emotional type), if he just knew who he was._

_"Please, what is my name?"_

_Red bites back an angry sound, Gavan' one of distress, but he has no use for feeling sorry for himself, not when his answers are so close._

_"It's Clint," Red tells him, her tone fierce yet somehow protective. "Clinton Francis Barton."_

_He rolls those names over in this mind. They feel right, but there is no bolt of lightning or Hollywood ending where he is abruptly restored._

_"You also go by the name Hawkeye," comes from Gavan', who is all sadness and resolve. "I'm Phil Coulson and Red is really Natasha Romanoff."_

_"The Black Widow," he – Clint – finishes, the imagery of a goddamn bow and arrow hearing … Phil saying Hawkeye invoked now expanding until he sees himself looking down a shaft he's pulled back to his cheek as he watches the Widow fight her way through a trio of men who had to have weighed twice what she had, in an economy of movement that is pure beauty._

_"We work together – " he asks for confirmation to what his mind is telling him._

_Both Natasha and Phil nod. "For an organization known as SHIELD," Phil then explained. "The Strategic Homeland Intervention Enforcement and Logistic Division."_

_Repeating the world SHIELD brings up a vision of an eagle symbol hanging behind a man with an eye patch, the sound of Phil's voice in his ear, memories of Natasha and him delivering death or bringing mayhem._

_"We're the good guys?" he has to ask._

_"Mostly," Phil says reassuringly._

_"We try to be," Natasha says at the same time although her tone holds a hint of that ironic sarcasm he remembers typifying her dark sense of humor. "You are certainly one of the good guys."_

_This last statement is given to Clint earnestly and conjures up another memory of sighting her, this time through the scope of a rifle, along with feelings of being torn – of fighting within himself._

_"I had orders to kill you." he breaths out._

_"Which you ignored," this time Phil sounded both exasperated and pleased._

_"I was not one of the good guys," Natasha clarifies with an up twist to her lips despite her deadpan delivery._

_"Not your fault," he says automatically, his certainty causing her to arch her brow._

_"I don't need to remember to_ know _that."_

_Natasha laughs and leans over to kiss his forehead. She then holds out her hand in entreaty toward Phil. He approaches slowly, moving toward her other side, but she gives him a moue of disapproval that has him changing course and then taking a seat next to Clint._

_Clint's sharp twist of disappointment fades as quickly as it had come over him. "We are more than co-workers," he offers up, the last major piece of himself slotting home when Phil nods. "I love the both of you, and you love me in return."_

_"You've lost your mind, Barton," Tasha mutters even as she burrows under Clint's arm which, not so incidentally pushes him into Phil's welcoming arms._

"Not anymore."

– finis –

 

,

 


End file.
